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Plot
After more than four hundred years of war between the Shinobi warriors of the Manjidani Koga and Tsubagakure Iga clans...

Release Year: 2005

Rating: 7.0/10 (6,713 voted)

Director:
Ten Shimoyama

Stars: Yukie Nakama, Jô Odagiri, Tomoka Kurotani

Storyline After more than four hundred years of war between the Shinobi warriors of the Manjidani Koga and Tsubagakure Iga clans, the Lord Hattori Hanzou decrees that they must live in peace. Both clans live hidden in the woods and mountain without confrontation and without training ninjas in the shadow art of Shinobi. In 1614, the Lord of the Lords is convinced that the clans are dangerous threats for keeping peace in his lands, and his advisor plots a Machiavellian plan to destroy their best warriors in a contest. Meanwhile, the young Iga Oboro and Koga Gennesuke fall in love for each other. When Oboro's grandmother and leader of Iga clan Ogen and Gennesuke's father and leader of the Koga clan Danjo kill each other, Oboro and Gannesuke must lead their warriors in the ultimate battle of the Shinobi clans.

The comments I've seen for this movie are the sole reason I signed up
at IMDb; in order to rebuke some of the harsh criticism given. I
haven't seen the Manga cartoon, or read the comic if there was one - so
I say unabashedly that I loved this film. I think at least one other
comment made was a reflection of bitterness about not having the film
remain faithful to the animated series, in whatever form it exists.

That said, for those who are new to it all, I HIGHLY recommend this
film to action lovers. I was thoroughly entertained from start to
finish... from start to finish, I say. Martial arts movies come in
three "fu's" by my classification:

"Regular-Fu": the kind that the incomparable Bruce Lee brought us
followed by acts like Chuck Norris, Steven Segal, Jean-Claude Van Damme
and the like; clean, physical and grounded.

"Wire-FU": This sub-genre has been best epitomized in films like
'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' and 'Hero', often used in Jet Li films
and even 'The Matrix Trilogy'. It's fast, hyper-acrobatic and aerial.

"Super-FU": This is where SHINOBI comes in. Fighters have very unique
abilities that are often much faster and deadlier that Wire-Fu styles.
This kind is fantastic, exceptional, and ethereal. If you could not
suspend belief enough to watch a film like 'Spiderman', there's little
chance you will like SHINOBI.

Now, for the special effects fighting nuts like myself, this film is a
really good one. The storyline is most reasonably adequate, I felt . It
is terse (stoic) all the way through, and has the action to match...
and the acting really compliments that air. And boy, do some of the
actors look their parts! There are no wasted sequences of nothingness
in this film; the story is coherent, especially when I consider other
movies of the same category, like 'The Duel' and 'The Promise'. On this
point I disagree with some other comments again.

I don't know if a sequel was planned but I really hope so. I fully
enjoyed the film, especially after expecting so little from what I
initially read here!